Women's Work

9 January 2017

Alas 2017 is upon us. You may be pleased to have seen away to 2016 though it was surely a year for sowing seeds for 2017 to bear some valuable fruit.

For starters, Embode is immensely proud to be part of an international collaboration that will see a high-calibre global women’s leadership programme come to Asia. It is a calling to mobilise women in a conscientious and resourceful way. In preparation, we have been ruminating on what it is about gendered identities of women that continue to hold us all back.

During my participation at a recent Women’s Economic Empowerment Conference held by FHI 360 and USAID in Bangkok, Thailand, I listened to the stories shared by courageous and inspiring women in their journey towards economic empowerment.Although I listened in my professional role, I could not help but reflect on my own personal career journey as a woman. No doubt I have had opportunities that my female foremothers did not have. At the same time, my path has taken turns it might not have otherwise taken had it not been for my being a woman. Doors have both closed and opened for me, on the basis of how my gender was experienced, both by the other and myself.

So I am curious about you, as you turn up for your roles, how do you bring all of your traits and skills, both considered feminine and masculine, in serving purpose? And how do these gendered ideas and concepts we assume as truths, impact what we see and don’t see as we relate to each other in our organisational, social and community circles?

In exploring these questions and their unfolding answers, it is important to understand how it’s both personal and systemic, how it’s both behavioural and cultural, and how it’s both offered and out there for our taking.